


Running Away (From So Many Things)

by Muccamukk



Category: Band of Brothers (TV 2001), Quantum Leap
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Crossover, Gen, No one is leaping, Post-War, Running Away, mention of past Winters/Nixon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:08:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22059832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk
Summary: It was a Wednesday night, and can't have been many ships in, because Lew only saw a couple tight-bottomed white uniforms, and the handful of other men seemed to be stevedores drinking their pay cheques in a familiar watering-hole. One was playing pool with a sailor, and another playing a cocky little kid, who Lew put at ten or twelve and a hustler in the making. No one played that badly in this kind of bar, not when they weren't drinking, and the kid wasn't.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 9
Collections: A Ficathon Goes Into A Bar





	Running Away (From So Many Things)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally started for intoabar, but only finished now.
> 
> Contains Nix's alcoholism and general post-war trashfire status, and Al's orphanage runaway backstory.

What Lew had said he was going to do was head up to Illinois and meet with the McCarty brothers to wine, dine and sweet talk them into renewing Nixon Nitration's contracts for gun cotton. What Lew had meant to do was get the lay of the land in post-war Chicago so that he could take Dick up this way next month to wine, dine and sweet talk him into giving the two of them another shot. What Lew was actually doing was what he was usually actually doing: getting drunk in a barely tolerable gin joint and pool hall just close enough to Chicago's wharves to look at tight-trousered sailors and consider a finding a tea room.

None of where he was now had seemed like a _good_ idea, but the Jack swirling in his glass sure did, and Lew wasn't much for following through with good ideas these days anyway. He was on his second glass, and was just starting to relax enough to start eyeing prospects. It was a Wednesday night, and can't have been many ships in, because Lew only saw a couple tight-bottomed white uniforms, and the handful of other men seemed to be stevedores drinking their pay cheques in a familiar watering-hole. One was playing pool with a sailor, and another playing a cocky little kid, who Lew put at ten or twelve and a hustler in the making. No one played that badly in this kind of bar, not when they weren't drinking, and the kid wasn't.

It was becoming increasingly clear that Lew had picked the wrong, bar, and that aside from having a non-terrible whiskey, he was going to be out of luck here. His navy suit had started out the day sharply pressed, and no amount of rumpling it picked up since was going to make Lew fit in here. Lew swirled the dregs of his second glass, watching it catch the glaring bare-bulbed electric light, and wondered if he could credit deliberate self-sabotage. Getting close and personal with sailors or dock workers wasn't too likely to put him in Dick's good books again, nor was blowing of a business trip. Not that Stanhope's plan to woo the McCartys back would work no matter if Lew hopped into bed with them either. They'd well and truly jumped ship for a competitor, and Lew couldn't say he blamed them. If any viable competition would have had him, Lew would have jumped ship too.

His glass was empty, so he ordered another. He didn't understand why Dick was still there. With a field rank and a college education, he could have gotten the same pay any number of places. It couldn't be because of Lew, not after the first few months at Nixon Nitration had made clear that Lew's title as plant manager was in name only, and the foremen and personnel managers did all the work. This wasn't the war, the two of them in the harness together, pulling for a higher purpose, each one covering the other's weaknesses and letting his strengths shine.

If there was a lower purpose than Nixon Nitration, Lew didn't want to know what it was.

Across the bar, the kid managed to miss the shot he should have clumsily made if he was going to "luck into winning" the first game with real money riding on it. The stocky bantam in rolled up shirt sleeves and a cloth cap jammed in his back pocket took the next shot and sank two balls. The kid was either going to have to give up money Lew bet he didn't have, or get suspiciously good at pool in a hurry. Lew had a feeling that the kind of guy who'd play a kid for money wasn't going to shrug and brush it off when he didn't get that money. He probably wasn't going to like getting rolled, either.

Lew could see the mathematics of probability going on behind the kids eyes: Risk getting a licking for being a hustler, or risk the same for not making good on a bet. The kid took a deep breath, his thin shoulders rising and falling, and sank five balls with the speed and accuracy that would have made Shifty Powers take off his helmet to the kid.

Lew grinned even as at the same time he knocked his drink back and unbuttoned his jacket. If the kid was about to get whipped, he wanted to do it making sure the idiot he was playing knew what he could do. It wasn't discreet, and it wasn't smart, but Lew could understand the impulse. Why go just down when you could go down in flames?

The noise of the jukebox covered what the idiot said, but Lew didn't have to hear it to know he was onto the kid. He slammed his cue down on the felt and stepped forward. His hands were balled up tight and his face was turning red.

The kid's eyes flashed over towards the door, but the angle of escape was off. He'd have to get right past the guy, and then around the pool table, then past two more guys, who might or might not be sympathetic to hustlers from out of town, even little ones. Then the kid did a survey of everyone else in the bar, same as Lew had coming in, weighing his chances. His eyes met Lew's; they were wide and scared, and had an edge of resignation in them, like he was pretty sure he was about to get a licking no matter what he did, and he knew from experience exactly what kind of hurt was coming his way.

His eyes were brown, like Lew's, like Lew's son's eyes, the handful of times Lew had seen them. Another kid whose dad just wasn't around.

Lew lifted his chin a in a fraction of a nod.

The kid ducked, scrambled right under the pool table, and popped back up at Lew's side. The idiot was hard on his heels, but came up short when he saw the kid ducking behind Lew's barstool.

If Lew hoped down, he was going to wobble on his feet, and he didn't want to show that he couldn't back up anything he said, besides, it made him look taller, sitting up here.

"What's all this?" Lew asked.

The kid piped up before the idiot could say anything. "This nozzle owes me a sawbuck," he said with the conviction of someone for whom ten dollars would make all the difference. If it'd make the fight go away, Lew would just have given it to him. Then the kid added, "Dad," like he wasn't sure how the word tasted in his mouth.

If they both got through the next five minutes without getting punched in the face, Lew was going to have a word with the kid about not overplaying his hand. Although, he had to admit the comedy value of watching the idiot do a double take as he looked over Lew's bespoke suit, and then the kid's patched sleeves and too-big shoes, then back to Lew.

He wasn't going to go for it.

The idiot squared up against Lew, glaring up at him pugnaciously. "Your 'son' is a filthy fucking cheat."

Lew was about to copy Dick and admonish the idiot for using that kind of language in front of a child, when the kid burst out with, "I am fucking not!"

Even a better man than Lew would have laughed just then. "Is that the way a gentleman talks, son?" Lew asked, since apparently he was in this now.

The kid dropped his eyes, his lower lip jutting out, and all Lew could see was messy brown curls. He'd had curls like that at the kid's age. "No, sir," the kid said, sounding utterly contrite.

The idiot may have been an idiot, but didn't buy the act for a second more than Lew did. "What kinda man lets his kid cheat honest men outta their wages?"

Lew shrugged. He hadn't actually thought this far. He held his hands out appeasingly. "Looked more like a bank shot than cheating to me," he said, not wanting to try to draw a line between betting someone money you didn't have and outright chicanery.

"Nine-ball's a lucky man's game," the kid added, not entirely helpfully in Lew's opinion.

"Way I see it," Lew continued, "you owe the kid a sawbuck."

The kid at least had the sense to stay quiet this time. The idiot did not.

"I don't owe you slumming sons of bitches a red cent!" he snapped, his face was turning purple in a way that Lew hadn't seen since the army, and his wiry muscles tensing. "What the fuck are you people doing in our bar?"

For the barest shade of a second, Lew considered actually telling him on the same principle as the kid had so ostentatiously won the game, but there was a child present. Besides, Lew could probably take him on size and training, if Lew had been sober, but he didn't want to risk it drunk. What was more, the bar was starting to pay more attention than it should. "Well," he said, like he'd to give the matter due consideration, "I was having a drink and watching my kid smoke some idiot at pool."

"And now you're scrapping with the same idiot," the kid added. He'd stepped forward so that now he was a little in front of Lew's knee. "Night's not looking up, is it, Dad?"

It really wasn't. The guy was about two seconds away from blowing his stack, and Lew wasn't really looking forward to having to explain a shiner to Dick on Monday. It was the sort of time that called for drastic measures. Lew straightened his spine and squared off to face the idiot, and did something he swore he'd never do. "Had worse," he said, easily. "That Christmas in Bastogne, when we were cut off: no chow, barely any bullets, Nazis on every side. That was _fractionally_ worse than having a drink in this dive."

The idiot just about jumped Lew, but just as he lurched forward, what he'd said filtered into his thick skull. "There's no goddamn way you were a Screaming Eagle!" he snarled, but there was doubt in his eyes. Lew was still lean from the years in Europe, and hadn't managed to shake the army out of his posture yet.

"Think so?" Lew asked. He hopped off the bar stool and—maybe because the Angels really did look out for fools and little children—didn't wobble on the landing. "I got jump wings with three combat stars and a knuckle sandwhich that'd show you otherwise." He had about five inches on the idiot, and a level stare that could make even Sobel leave him alone, and what's more he had the ghosts of the Battered Bastards of Bastogne backing him up. He wondered if Dick would approve of using his beloved Airborne's name in like this.

The idiot sized Lew up, glanced at the bartender, who Lew guessed didn't show any sign of wanting a para-infantry dust up in his establishment, then dug into his pocket.

Lew tensed, his hands twitching like he wanted to reach for a pistol he didn't carry any more. It'd serve him right if he made it through the war without getting worse than a graze, only to get knocked off by a Chicago dockworker. Stanhope would laugh all the way to the graveyard. Dick, hopefully, would not. Lew really was stupid.

But the idiot only pulled out a clip of bills and peeled off ten grubby singles. Lew heard the kid take a sharp breath and put his hand on the kid's shoulder, instinctively holding him back.

"Take it and get the fuck out," the idiot said, as graceful in losing an argument as he had been in losing a game of pool.

The kid snatched the bills before Lew could say a word. His eagerness was probably out of character, but it hardly mattered now.

"I'm putting the word out on you two," the idiot said, like he thought Lew would give a shit. Well, maybe the kid would, but he wasn't especially identifiable without Lew.

Lew shrugged, and held his hand up to the bartender for another whiskey. The idiot spun on his heel and stomped off, not stopping until he was right out the door.

"Don't go away mad, just go away," Lew muttered. He sighed and heaved himself back up on the barstool.

The kid hopped up on the one next to him, eyeing him like a zoo animal. Great, just what Lew needed. He'd hoped the kid would have the smarts to take the money and run.

"Where's your dad?" Lew asked.

"Dead, where's yours?" The kid snapped back with the alacrity of long practice.

"New Jersey," Lew said, thinking it wasn't quite far enough.

There was a silence, and Lew tried to think what he should do next. He really had no idea about this mentor bullshit. That was supposed to be Dick's line. Or Lew's if he'd been any good at sticking around. Should he ask where the kid was supposed to be? Offer advice? Call the cops?

"What'd you need the money for?" he asked, finally.

"I'm running away," the kid answered, still glib, and Lew tried to read if there was any fear in him at all. "Heading down to New Orleans."

He lifted his chin like he expected a reprimand for his bad behaviour, but Lew wasn't that much of a hypocrite. "Thought you might be running away to join the circus," he commented for the sake of saying something.

The kid's lips thinned and he slumped a little. "Tried that last time," he admitted. "Didn't work out."

"Huh." Lew took a sip of his whiskey and wondered if he should offer to buy the kid a coke or possibly a meal. But no, this wasn't his problem. He'd done more than enough already, including blowing any chances of finding some company for the evening. Again, he wondered if he was sabotaging himself on purpose.

"Did you really jump out of airplanes?" the kid asked, shaking Lew out of his woolgathering.

Lew snorted. "What, you think a man would lie about his service record?" When the kid rolled his eyes, he added more seriously, "I did. Second Battalion, 506th Parainfantry Regiment, 101st Airborne."

"That's stupid," the kid said, derision dripping from his voice. "Why didn't you fly the planes instead?"

People, mainly Lew's sister, had asked before why he hadn't kept his cushie gig with the MPs in California, or why he hadn't tried to get a staff position in DC. The kid was the first person Lew had met that thought that becoming an Army Air Force pilot would have been the better option. "My best friend wanted to jump out of them," Lew said, then added in a fit of honestly, "And being a pilot is a lot of studying and that... stuff."

"You can say bullshit," the kid informed him, but he seemed to be thinking of Lew's answer. "My best friend was a pet roach named Kevin, but I'm all right studying."

"Was never my area," Lew said, but he was already tired of this conversation, of this whole damn night. He didn't even want company any more, or the rest of his whiskey, though he knocked it back anyway. All he wanted to do was catch a cab back his hotel and sack out, then mope back to New Jersey and find Dick. He'd remembered what it was like to get caught up in Dick's enthusiasm, and wanted that again. Hell, he just wanted to see Dick smile again, and know it was just meant for him. He had a sick feeling that Dick's smile was only thing from keeping him from naming pet roaches, or would be down the road.

"You going already, Mister?" the kid asked. He sounded oddly disappointed.

Lew shrugged. "Looks like. Don't you have a bus to catch or something?"

"Yeah," the kid said, but with less of the savour of transgression than earlier. Lew wondered what he was thinking about. Lew had gotten his wallet out and was thumbing through it to pay his tab when the kid burst out: "That's it? All you havta do to be a pilot is be good at school?"

"And bullshit," Lew added. "You have to be very good at bullshit. but you seem to have a handle on that already."

The kid looked Lew up and down in assessment, this time not judging the likelihood of him bailing the kid out, but his general competence. "Huh."

Lew turned back to his wallet, slapping a couple bills down on the counter, and letting the change be. He had the feeling that the kid had found him wanting some essential quality, but that was nothing new, or even surprising. The kid had just joined a club consisting of such esteemed members as Lew's parents, his ex-wife, his ex-lover, and—once he was old enough to talk—his son.

"I'll see you around, kid," Lew said, not really meaning it, and wobbled towards the door. The ground was a lot less steady than he'd expected it to be.

"Sure, Mister," the kid said, with just as much sincerity. "See you around." Smartass.

Still, as Lew pulled his coat tighter around him and wound his way down the street in hope of a cab, he wished the kid well. Hell, maybe he'd have the sense to fly airplanes rather than jump out of them.


End file.
